Mark Hoban

Financial secretary to the Treasury Mark Hoban has defended auto-enrolment after a senior pension adviser labeled it the next mis-selling scandal.

The Treasury has today laid out its plans for the Equitable Life Payments Scheme.

The government is on track to begin paying compensation to Equitable Life victims before the end of June, financial secretary to the Treasury Mark Hoban confirms.

Plans to allow early access to pension savings have been buried after a consultation revealed "insufficient evidence" it would encourage more saving, the Treasury says.

The Treasury says people exceeding the annual allowance on pension savings must meet their tax charges as soon as they arise.

The government has launched a public consultation on giving people under-55 early access to their pension.

The annual allowance will be cut from £255,000 to £50,000; the lifetime allowance reduced from £1.8m to £1.5m, and the factor for valuing final salary benefits increased from 10 to 16, the Treasury has announced.

Tom McPhail has written to financial secretary to the Treasury Mark Hoban in an attempt to put the "final nail in the coffin" of insurers' resistance to reform of the Open Market Option.

Equitable Life has urged the government to honour the Parliamentary Ombudsman's recommendation to make fair payments to policyholders.

The Tories say they will scrap means testing for Equitable Life victims if they are elected.